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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26432449">Homeward</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/thedevilchicken/pseuds/thedevilchicken'>thedevilchicken</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Assassin's Creed - All Media Types</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Antagonism, F/M, Getting Together, Kassandra is Deimos (Assassin's Creed), Rescue Missions</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-09-12</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-09-12</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 04:02:08</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,545</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26432449</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/thedevilchicken/pseuds/thedevilchicken</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>He wasn't the one she expected to come for her.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Kassandra/Stentor (Assassin's Creed)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>23</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Press Start VI</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Homeward</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">
      <li>For <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/StopTalkingAtMe/gifts">StopTalkingAtMe</a>.</li>



    </ul></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>She hadn't thought Stentor would be the one they sent to bring her back. </p><p>Frankly, she hadn't expected anyone to come at all. Why would they? She was out of place in Sparta and that fact really hadn't been lost on anyone in the time that she'd been living there. Their customs made no fucking sense and while Alexios got away with bumbling through, with a smile and a quick screech of his eagle to remind them who he was, Deimos didn't have that going for her. What she had was the fact she'd killed their general at Amphipolis and had been raised almost her entire life someplace that wasn't Sparta. And maybe she could fight, yes, and maybe she was better than almost anyone in the whole damned city, the whole of Lakonia, the whole fucking Peloponnese, but women weren't warriors in Sparta. They'd let her train, though mostly just with her brother or with Stentor, but they hadn't let her fight. </p><p>So, she'd left. She hadn't been quiet about it - she'd taken her sword because it wasn't like Alexios was using it, and she'd taken her armour because it wasn't like it fit him right, and she'd taken a fat purse full of his drachmae because it wasn't like he didn't have enough of it for ten lifetimes, and she'd left the city alone to go try to find out how she might fit in in future, or maybe just if she fit anywhere at all. Stentor had caught her on her way, coming in from a hunt with men who might have been his friends except she'd never heard him talk like he was friendly. He'd looked at her, coming into Sparta as she was going out, and she'd almost expected him to ask where she was going. He hadn't. All he'd done was nod, like he knew and understood, and then he'd gone off on his way. She'd appreciated that.</p><p>She hadn't expected anyone to come but in the idle time between jobs, wandering from place to place, earning money as a misthios just like her big brother, she'd wondered who they might send if they needed her. She'd imagined it being Alexios, because he left the city so often anyway - he was permitted the kind of free movement around Greece, and out of Sparta, that most other Spartans weren't. She imagined he'd want her to fight with him, and maybe no one else would do - she imagined he needed the strongest warrior in all of Greece and that was her, of course it was. But it wasn't Alexios that came. It was Stentor. </p><p>"What do you want?" she asked, when he sat down at her tavern table. </p><p>He wasn't exactly inconspicuous: he was wearing full Spartan armour, though his shield was hanging from his horse's saddle and not attached to his left arm, and he hadn't tried to bring his spear indoors. He didn't seem concerned with people knowing he was a Spartan soldier; they left him alone because of it, which probably wasn't by design, but she didn't imagine he'd complain about it. She'd spent long enough fighting him back outside their father's home in Sparta to know he wasn't looking for friendship. She often felt the same.</p><p>"Your mother wants you to come home," he said. </p><p>She rested her elbows on the table and leaned forward on them as she raised both brows. </p><p>"And you take orders from my mother now, Stentor?" </p><p>He sighed. He sat back heavily. "Of course not," he said. "Our father wants you to come home, too." </p><p>She smiled wryly. "And you take orders from our father?" she asked. "I thought he'd retired from the army." </p><p>"He has." </p><p>"Then what?"</p><p>Stentor scowled. He eyed her. "I was sent to find your brother," he said. "He's been missing for more than a month." </p><p>"He does that." </p><p>"Not like this." </p><p>Stentor reached out and drummed his fingers on the table; she knew he had the same sort of callused hands that she did, from fighting, and training, and probably killing, just for people who weren't the Cult of Kosmos though sometimes she didn't see how it was so much different. He clenched his jaw, hissed in a breath, then said, "I found this." </p><p>He reached down to the bag he was carrying and set something on the table that was wrapped up in an old black cloth. He gestured at it, telling her to open it; she bristled at the fact that he'd felt so free to instruct her in what her next move should be, but she turned the cloth back anyway. Wrapped in it was her grandfather's broken spear - the one her brother never let out of his sight. </p><p>She didn't need to ask where he'd found it: the cloth was something that the Followers of Ares wore. She didn't need to ask how he'd come to have it in his possession: he still had blood under his fingernails that he hadn't quite managed to scrub away. And she didn't need to ask what he suggested they do next: he'd come there in his armour, with his weapons. He'd come to find <i>her</i>, of all people alive in all of Greece. She doubted that was for her pretty face, though he'd sometimes seemed to admire it.</p><p>"Let's go," she said. When she stood up, he joined her. Outside, her brother's screeching eagle led the way.</p><p>The cave was dark, lit only by torches. Its corners were darker, and she knew they should have stuck to them. They even tried, in the start, but she knew he hadn't come to her for prowess as a silent killer; when they inevitably failed in their stealth approach, she took the broken spear in her left hand and smiled as she felt its power. Stentor hefted his fucking Spartan shield. They fought together, for the first time, instead of fighting one another. They fought well, she thought, back to back, around the dingy fucking caves, storming through them like the whole gods-damned Spartan army. And when they found Alexios, she grimaced as she passed him the spear through the bars of his cage that really didn't hold him for much longer. He freed the other captives while she and Stentor finished off what was left of the Followers. </p><p>When they left the cave, her heart was still pounding hard inside her chest. She and Stentor brought up the rear, behind the prisoners Alexios was leading up to daylight through the winding tunnels, through the blood they'd spilled. She had some on her hands, and on her sword, and on her armour; when she glanced at Stentor, he did, too. And, when she glanced at Stentor, he glanced back. Her heart beat harder. She scowled and looked away again, but she didn't need to look to know that he was watching her. She hoped the low light in the tunnels and the flicker of the torch could mask the way she blushed. She'd never been one for blushing, not even for a man who fought the way he did.</p><p>When they reached the surface, they escorted the prisoners to the nearest village. And, afterwards, they sat down by a fire with meat they'd bought with coin they'd found inside the Followers' cave. In the time she'd been away, she'd started to see exactly how Alexios had come by so much drachmae; her own purse was very nearly overflowing.</p><p>"Did my parents really send you?" she asked him, quietly, while Alexios was feeding his stupid fucking eagle. </p><p>"Yes," Stentor replied. "The mission was twofold. They do miss you." </p><p>"So it wasn't just for him?" She jerked her chin at her eagle-feeding brother. </p><p>"The kings sent me for him," he said. "Your parents asked me to find you on the way back." </p><p>She frowned. "So why did you find me on the way there?" </p><p>"That was my idea," he said, as his mouth twisted into something that she couldn't quite have called a smile. "Do you think there's anyone in Sparta who can match me like you?" He raised his brows. "Who can <i>challenge</i> me like you?"</p><p>Honestly, she didn't think there was. But she didn't have to say so; the look on his face said he already knew. He'd known since Sparta, before she'd left.</p><p>When they slept that night, she spread her bed roll close to his. He raised his brows at that, too, but he didn't object; he wrapped his hand around her wrist instead, awkwardly, but her face turned warm from the gesture. </p><p>When they woke in the morning, she took him out into the woods and kissed him on the mouth while Alexios was cooking. He raised his brows at that, too, but didn't lack enthusiasm when she pinned him up against the nearest tree. She supposed that was just another way for her to challenge him, and it had perhaps been a very long time coming. </p><p>And, when they left that place, she went with the two of them. He seemed pleased by that, in his own strange way. </p><p>She still wasn't sure if she really had a place in Sparta. But, for the first time, riding at his side, she wasn't sure she didn't.</p>
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